Artem Lobov: Conor McGregor will stop Dustin Poirier again in first round at UFC 257

Artem Lobov rates Dustin Poirier’s skills very highly but thinks Conor McGregor is simply on another level.

McGregor, Lobov’s longtime training partner and good friend, is set to face Poirier in the UFC 257 main event on Jan. 23, a rematch from over six years ago. In their first meeting in 2014, McGregor (22-4 MMA, 10-2 UFC) made quick work of Poirier, needing only one minute and 46 seconds to take him out.

But despite both fighters massively progressing since then, Lobov doesn’t see the rematch going any differently.

“I see this fight going exactly the same way,” Lobov told MMA Junkie Radio. “The reason being is everybody’s trying to make it out like Poirier wasn’t good before he fought Conor or something like that, like he’s changed so much. No, remember what Poirier was. He was the No. 5 featherweight in the world. He was destroying guys. You remember his fight with (Erik) Koch, who was a top 10 featherweight at the time. He stopped him. Brandao, this guy was an absolute killer. It’s just people don’t want to give Conor credit for destroying these guys.

“Poirier was a killer back then, but just stylistically, his style matches up so well (for) Conor, that Conor will stop him again in the first round, and it’ll be no different than their first meeting. So Poirier was good before they fought the first time, just Conor was so good that he destroyed Poirier like that and then after that, Poirier went back to doing what he was doing before he fought Conor, dominating and being a very good fighter, so I don’t see anything changing this time around.”

Lobov, who’s gearing up for a fight of his own on Dec. 12 against Ylies Djiroun in France, hasn’t gotten an opportunity to help McGregor in his training camp yet but vows to be in his corner as always when the former two-division champion makes the walk against Poirier.